


Life Is Full Of Your Regrets (And I Should Be One)

by latinaeinstein (oneforyourfire)



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-21
Updated: 2018-12-21
Packaged: 2019-09-24 04:47:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17094185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oneforyourfire/pseuds/latinaeinstein
Summary: They have potential





	Life Is Full Of Your Regrets (And I Should Be One)

**Author's Note:**

> 2014 fic, from the 2014 round of soccerandcoffee
> 
> warnings for past lukai

Lu Han is kind of a catch. His roommate Kyungsoo reacts visibly to that observation. Choking on his bran flakes in the early morning, wheezing out a retort. Because that’s vain as _fuck_ , hyung. Unbecoming, too. Don’t—don’t tell anyone you think that about yourself.

Lu Han _is_ , though. Just objectively speaking. He’s tall and young and attractive. Non-threatening. Not creepy. Not _weird_. He’s got a nice apartment, a great job, the kind of smile that makes people want to talk to you.

So he barrels on. Heedless of Kyungsoo’s raised eyebrow, his still-sleepy indignation.

Lu Han recently recognized that he could do better for himself. So he’s not just gonna hook up with random men anymore, okay. He kinda wants something more _substantial_. With somebody more permanent. He’s come to a realization, and it would be great if Kyungsoo—whose face has twisted into something more like shocked wariness—if Kyungsoo helped him out. Helped him find something more substantial with somebody more permanent.

Kyungsoo hesitates, shoulders stiff and eyes narrowed. Murmurs about not wanting to subject even his worst enemies to Lu Han’s attentions and affections. A joke. To test the waters, Lu Han knows.

But it’s 7AM, and Lu Han’s just had a revelation. So he decides to plays dirty. “I just—look I haven’t since _him_ , and I just want—but I’m not good at—and you _are_.”

It isn’t _fair_ , he knows. And he’s expecting Kyungsoo to call him out on it. Because Kyungsoo was there. Offering his spare bedroom, letting Lu Han into his space, cradling him as he’d cried and cried and cried. Kyungsoo was _there_. Helping. Healing. And it isn’t fair, he _knows_.

“I just want to try, you know. _Really_ try, because I haven’t been,” he adds after a beat. Sure to flutter his eyelashes as he blinks up at Kyungsoo.

And he’s _expecting_ a retort, but the tension bleeds out of Kyungsoo’s shoulders as he sighs in resignation. “I’ll, I’ll set you up.”

Lu Han grins.

 

And it had been real when it had hit him that morning in the shower. The realization, the sudden _determination_ potent and heavy and _beautiful_ , animating his limbs, buzzing in his veins. It had felt so _real_. Washing himself clean. Watching the past 11 months of shame and suffering and distractions wash down the drain. Along with his shampoo. Along with his soap.

It _had_ been real.

But old habits die hard, and it’s so fucking _easy_ —too fucking easy, much easier than it should be, _really_ —to get men to fall into bed with him. Handsome men. Intelligent men. Mature men. Men his own age. A small, promising smile, a deliberate bite to his lip, a lingering touch over the dinner table, and they’re _his_. Gasping into his mouth, tugging on his hair, clenching around cock.

It starts off noble enough. But there’s a certain thrill in it.

The softness of kisses when they think there’s something there, something to prove. The headiness of an “I don’t usually do this” swallowed with an easy kiss, choked back on a needy moan. Fingertips caressing in reverent dips. Bodies moving together in desperate need. An almost cruelty, if he wasn’t quick to call it what it was. A fleeting _almost_ encased in time, channeled into nude bodies, heavy touches.

We weren’t meant for forever, Lu Han thinks as he kisses forehead, the corners of mouths in the early morning, not meant for cosmic declarations and the knee-buckling heaviness of _real love_. We weren’t, but this was nice, right.

He doesn’t ever stop to check if they agree.

 

Not anybody that you would want to lose, he should have said. But Kyungsoo doesn’t begrudge him beyond a slight grimace. A passing comment about how he doesn’t have many gay friends, hyung. And they don’t like getting their hearts broken.

And seven dates in, Kyungsoo runs out.

 

But Sehun is quick to intervene. That next Monday, smiling winningly at him across the shitty imitation wood tables in the teacher’s lounge. He’s much too chipper, and he’s got his hair slicked back with too much gel, styled into a faux hawk because he _likes_ being the cool substitute. _Mr. Oh_ , he introduces himself. _But you can call me “Sehun” or “Oh Cool Dude” or “Teacher Bro,” really, you guys_.

It’s a wonder—Lu Han’s friendship—that he gets called back so often.

“A little bird—” Sehun starts, reaching forward to steal one of Lu Han’s chips. “A tiny little angry bird with _giant_ eyes and the _prettiest_ face you’ve ever seen tells me you’re still looking.”

“What’s it to you?” he counters, smacking his hand away.

Sehun just preens.

“It’s _everything_ to me, hyung. You’re everything to me, hyung.”

Lu Han grimaces, and Sehun’s grin just widens.

“You really are,” Yixing—10th grade, biology—cuts in, falling beside Sehun, patting his head affectionately. “You’re all he talks about. His lonely hyung who just needs to settle down. Heal his beautiful little heart.”

Lu Han swallows suddenly, discreetly. Because Sehun, Sehun’s been trying. But Sehun doesn’t comment on Lu Han’s expression—if he catches it—just nods.

“And I _have_ somebody for you, hyung. I met him at my gym a while back. He’s cute, smart—you’ll like him. I mean, I thought at first, he was into _me_ , you know? Because I mean—” Sehun drags his thumb up and down his body in a self important sweep. White button up, obnoxious Avenger’s tie, black slacks. “But he’s really nice. Kinda quiet. He teaches taekwondo for kids. I know you’re a sucker for that kind of shit.”

(Jongin, Jongin taught ballet.)

“So I took the liberty of showing him your picture—”

“Which one?” Lu Han cuts in.

And Sehun is reaching into his pocket to show him his phone. The three of them plus Kyungsoo, Jongin, Tao at the bar after Sehun got his teaching certification. Lu Han’s mid laugh, arm around Jongin’s shoulder.

“You don’t have any other—”

“No, I don’t, but he said you’re cute, too. Here this is him.”

And he is _attractive_. Hair plastered to his forehead, wide cheeks, thick eyebrows, dark, sharp eyes, pink lips crinkling into a big smile.

“Oh wow,” he murmurs, picturing those lips dragging ruddy and soft against his collarbone, those eyes hooding as he moans.

Yixing leans over to peek too, hums his approval.

“His name is Minseok. You guys have a date on Saturday.”

 

Minseok texts him an hour before. He asks him to bring his own bread, he doesn’t want to share. And they meet in a park. Minseok’s wearing a polo and shorts, hair and sun in his eyes, as he smiles shyly through a greeting. He hesitates before taking Lu Han’s hand, dragging him to the duck pond.

“These ones are the nicest,” he tells him.

And it’s different from Lu Han’s usual dates.

They feed ducks as Minseok talks about his students. Lay back against the grass as Lu Han talks about his.

Minseok’s voice is soft and the sun is warm and it’s _nice_ , Lu Han thinks. Staring at the pink behind his eyelids as Minseok talks about his school. His education. As Lu Han contributes with anecdotes about when he’d first moved to the city. Subway fiascos. Apartment hunting. Laundromat adventures in the early dawn.

Minseok taps against his wrist after a while, asks if he wants to maybe get a smoothie. And they rise on shaky legs, hands brushing against each other as they search for a nearby shop.

 

Minseok sits across him in the soft afternoon light. Smile more pronounced as he sips at his banana strawberry.

“Let’s get to the heavier stuff,” he proposes suddenly, lips curling against his red straw. “Why 10th grade, Mr. Lu?”

“Ah well—they’re just on the brink of adulthood,” Lu Han gestures awkwardly as he speaks. “You know, just on the verge of finding themselves. And I’m teaching them _math_ , so it’s not like I’m really—teaching them about life. But they’re growing up right in front of me. They have a lot of _potential_.”

He pauses to take a long drag from his pomegranate smoothie. Minseok nods thoughtfully.

“What about you, Mr. Kim? Five year olds?”

“Brand new humans, still,” he laughs. “Babies—they’re still figuring things out. Still learning how to walk properly, you know. So—so clumsy and just really shoddy locomotor skills, but they’re so eager to learn. _So_ cute about it.”

“Okay, heavier stuff,” Lu Han says leaning forward, hands clapping against the plastic table between them. “First heart break?”

And it’s closer to the usual spiel. Even if the location, the timing are just slightly off. Intelligent conversations, attractive smiles, tension built up and up and up to the very brim before—

“So what are you hoping to get out of this?” Minseok asks, and his tone is light but his gaze is meaningful.

“No—that’s, too—”

“Okay. Okay. What are you hoping to get out of blind dates in general?”

“A good time,” he answers. Vague. Honest. “Nothing, too—you know. I like meeting people.”

Minseok lets out this little hum. Soft and slightly pitchy. “Are you looking for something more _you know_?”

“I kinda just got—got out of a serious relationship, so I’m still—testing the waters. But I’m not—I’m not looking for the next big thing at the moment, you know.”

“Ah—that’s—that’s kinda unfortunate then—”

“Are you?” Lu Han’s voice is louder, sharper than he means it to be. Slightly jarring in the soft buzz of afternoon.

Minseok just blinks carefully in surprise. “ _Eventually_ , yeah. I want to have something to show for my efforts. Meeting people is _nice_. _You’re_ nice, but I think I’m looking for something _more_.”

And this is an impasse.

“Love?” Lu Han tries.

“Yeah and domesticity, you know. Like—okay just—somebody to wake up to. Somebody to kiss good morning and good night. And you know—I wash dishes if you take out the trash. We alternate cooking during the week. Get take out on the weekends. Just lame domestic shit. _Love_ shit. We just fit together. We just become kinda permanent fixtures in each other’s lives. But—ah—that’s really heavy for the first date, right? Especially a _blind_ date,” he laughs. “But I’m 26. And I want to be honest with myself.”

And it’s practical honestly, as far as _wants_ go. But Minseok’s voice, his eyes are soft. His fingers, too, soft and shy as they brush briefly against his. There’s gleam of wistfulness clinging to his thick eyelashes.

“That’s how I define love,” he continues, quick to fill in the void of Lu Han’s contemplative silence, warm fingers still grazing his. And it’s not as not as raw, not as desperate, not as consuming and intense as Lu Han’s own. But still _more_ tha Lu Han wants right now. “That’s what I want, what I’m looking for. _Eventually_.”

Lu Han stares at Minseok’s hands as he speaks. Watches restless pink fingertips trace over his own pale wrist. Absentminded but distracting.

“Is that—should we—not?” he finally asks, compelling Lu Han to action.

And Lu Han looks up at him.

_It’s cruel_ , Kyungsoo had told him. _It’s cruel to pretend. It’s fine if you don’t pretend, if you’re straightforward, but don’t lie to people. Don’t do that, hyung. Not to my friends. Not to anybody. Not for the sake of your libido_.

And Minseok eyes are expectant. And he’s smiling. And his fingers are still whisper soft against his wrist.

“I was—almost—for a while, but he—we—” _Broke_ “I can’t promise anything.”

Minseok exhales slowly, pursing his lips. “So heavy.” His smile is self-deprecating. Slightly sad.

Lu Han decides to press his luck.

“It’s not a matter of compatibility,” he notes. “Attraction, right?”

Minseok sucks his bottom lip into his mouth. Teeth peeking out, black hair falling in his eyes as he shakes his head.

“So what if we just—how about we,” he proposes clumsily. “How about we just capitalize on _this_. Pretend that we’re _there_ already. Indulge our overlapping areas, act on our attraction, and just—”

“So I fuck—” Lu Han arches a brow, and Minseok bites back a laugh. _Hard_. “Or _you_ —fuck me and then—what? I remember you with the fondness of an almost lover?”

Lu Han nods, flushes.

And Minseok laughs. It’s harder than his real laugh. The one he made as he watched the ducks waddle for his bread crumbs. It’s huskier. Darker. Sexier. More dangerous. And he blinks slowly. Dark eyes _sharp_ , cuting. Oh _fuck_.

“Fuck you, don’t give me a fucking line.”

“I’m not—”

“Yes, you are. Look, I like you,” he tells him, amicably enough. “So I’m gonna pretend you didn’t just say that.”

Lu Han’s mouth falls open in a surprise. And it takes him a good minute of gaping to recover, protest. By that point Minseok’s smile has softened around the edges. It almost reaches his eyes and oh wow, it’s beautiful. Dangerous and beautiful.

“Sex is nice,” he argues, murmurs. “Sex is—”

“Of course. Orgasms—they’re fucking _amazing_. Heat and touch and _want_ —but I’m not 21 anymore. I’m not in fucking _college_. I’m not just barely out and trying to make up for all I’d denied myself in high school. And I like—I _want_ sex that _means_ something.”

“This can mean something,” Lu Han insists. “Just because it’s an isolated incident doesn’t mean it’s meaningless. It _can_ mean something.” And Minseok’s eyebrow quirks. His face twists into something bemused, but _hard_ , guarded. Lu Han wants to reach forward, smooth the anger, the indignation away.

“Not if you forget my number the next day.”

Lu Han doesn’t know how to respond, so he taps his fingers in a nervous tattoo. Traces them restlessly against the styrofoam of his cup. Minseok’s fingers are still lingering near his.

“You don’t really want to have sex with me, Lu Han,” Minseok continues easily.

And Lu Han images those plump cheeks flushed, lean body glistening, red lips parted as he rises and falls on Lu Han’s cock. He pictures that dark hair plastered to his forehead, those dark sinful eyes burning with lust behind fluttering eyelashes. And no, Minseok’s _wrong_. Lu Han _definitely_ wants that.

Lu Han is about to protest, and Minseok is quick to cut in. “Not with somebody that wants more.”

“I—I respect that—but I just—”

“You don’t, though. And it’s _fine_. But I don’t fuck on the first date, okay?”

“Why?”

“Because it’s not—I don’t _know_ you. You don’t know me. It’s best that way, you know. When you _care_ about somebody. ”

Lu Han shakes his head. “That’s such a—”

“Okay, but just...early morning I wake up in your arms for the seventh time this week, and your hair is falling in your eyes and against my cheek. And the sunlight is soft on your face, and I kiss you. And you have morning breath, but you’re—so warm, so soft, and _mine_. And it’s really lazy, you know. Sleepy and kinda stilted. But you pull me in closer, and I—I get to know your body again. And you mine. Even though we’ve done this before. _So_ many times. It’s so comfortable. It’s so natural. That’s it. That’s the best. _That’s_ what I want.”

“That’s not a first time,” Lu Han counters, breathlessly because _yes_.

Minseok’s eyelids flutter downwards. He blinks shyly. Look unsure for the first time since they broached the subject. “I want it to lead to that. Eventually. I want to have that _potential_. I want to have that option. I’m not in the business of my denying myself. I want to be heading towards that. And if we’re not—what’s the point, right?

And he makes it sound so practical, so logical, so _easy_. Wanting more, planning for tenuous futures. And Minseok is hot, charming, but there are strings attached, asterisks, dependent clauses.

Lu Han hums.

“Is _that_ an overlap?” he asks softly, after a beat. “Is that something we can capitalize on?”

Lu Han nods slowly after a beat, and Minseok smiles again. For real. Wide and genuine, teeth peeking out. Eyes crinkling.

“Okay.”

 

Minseok walks him home. And as they linger outside his apartment building, Lu Han presses the point once more. “If you want to—come up...”

Minseok shakes his head. Resolutely.

“I’m not—that’s not what I want. Not right now. It was fine when I was younger, but not anymore.” He sighs, hesitates. “Frankly, I’m—I’m hot enough to get what I want.”

“Me?” Lu Han asks, and Minseok’s sudden grin is dangerous in the afternoon light. Innocent at the surface, indulgent, but there’s something in his eyes. Dark and liquid and glimmering. Something self aware. _I’m humoring you,_ it seems to say, but I always win. And I’d fucking ruin you.

Lu Han swallows thickly, fiddles with the phone in his pocket.

“Yes.”

 

Lu Han waits 3 hours before texting him. Apologizing for potentially making things awkward. Saying he had a nice time.

Minseok texts back a smiley face, and Lu Han can’t help but grin at his phone screen. Grin over dinner. Grin when Kyungsoo comes back from the grocery store.

He regards him warily. Suspiciously. But he doesn’t comment.

And from his tank by the kitchen, his pet goldfish, Kris, seems to judge him for it, too.

 

Sehun, though. Sehun has no problem commenting. He’s wearing a Spiderman tie this time. Light blue button-up, khakis. As he collapses heavily across from him on the table. Smile so fucking _obnoxious_ when Lu Han’s just trying to make the most of his peanut butter and jelly sandwich, finish early so he can go back to lesson planning.

But Sehun doesn’t allow for it.

“How was your date, hyung?”

“Nice,” he answers noncommittally. And Sehun fucking _pouts_.

“Hyung,” he whines. “Hyung, please. Come _on_. Tell me.”

Lu Han prickles with indignation.

“You didn’t—you didn’t tell me that he was looking for something serious. I’m not—I don’t, you _know_ that.”

“No, you do. I know you do.”

“That’s obnoxious, Sehun,” he balks, spine stiffening. “And not true.”

“No, I _know_ you, hyung. I do, and you do. You meant it when you told Kyungsoo you wanted to date again. And I _know_ you, I do.”

“He does,” Yixing interrupts. “He does, and I do. And you _do_.”

Lu Han grimaces. Thinks about cutting them out of his life as they nod at each other. Agree once more. That he _does_. He’s been scared to admit because he’s been hurt. But he _does_.

And Lu Han, Lu Han doesn’t need this.

But Sehun has been a semi-permanent fixture in his life for too long. A comfortable presence. Persistent and just slightly grating, but his body has developed a callous already. And Lu han can’t quite imagine life without him at this point.

And Yixing moralizing, romantic, obnoxious, but his oldest friend. Soft and understanding and sleepy affection. The one that knows him most.

He swallows done another bite of his sandwich.

And Sehun is a kid—a fucking _kid_ —and single and _straight_. But he still feels incumbent upon him to comment. “Love, hyung,” he whispers solemnly, normally impassive face twisting into something like sympathy—fucking _gross_. “Love can be hard, but you have to let yourself—It’s the risk, you know. The risk that makes it worth it”

“Shut the fuck up,” he bites back. “I’m not trying to fall in _love_ , Sehun.”

But Sehun has known him a _long_ time, too. And Sehun, Sehun’s been there since the beginning. And he was there to help piece him back together afterwards. And Lu Han can’t begrudge him his youth, his sexuality, his dating status as a sudden flood of affection overwhelms him. His scalp tingles with it and his fingers are too restless and his cheeks too warm.

And Sehun seems to sense it, wide grin melting from proud to almost soft. It stretches his cheeks horribly, crinkles his eyes. Makes him look 5.

“Just _date_ , hyung. When is the last time you dated? When is the last time you let a handsome boy take you out on the town?”

Lu Han huffs out a laugh, and Yixing leans forward to press on his cheek, softening his scowl, forcing it away with the insistent pressure of his warm fingers.

“You’ll get wrinkles,” he chides, leaning further forward to cradle his face, thumbing idly along his cheekbones. “That pretty face is one of your few assets. You have to take care of it.”

Lu Han crinkles his nose in indignation, furrows his eyebrows. And Sehun joins Yixing, in leaning forward, smoothing it away. The pads of his thumb is warm and tender as it brushes against the crease of his eyebrow.

“You’re obnoxious,” he groans, slapping him away.

“We’re taking _care_ of you, hyung. This is how you treat people you love.”

Lu Han almost wants to protest the obvious fact— _futilely_ , of course—but decides against it. The next bite of his sandwich is almost malicious.

And maybe— _maybe_ —he’ll allow that Sehun has a _point_. It’s been almost a year, and it’s not like it’s unheard of—to stop mourning a broken love, to try to settle down _again_.

 

So they date.

Their second is at a soccer field. Lu Han’s heart hammering his chest as he chases after the ball, breathes hard through his mouth. They fall into each other afterwards, sweaty, laughing but Minseok pulls away with a wheezing laugh before Lu Han has a chance to _really_ touch him. Enact some painfully vivid fantasies that have him peeling off Minseok’s sweat-slick jersey, pressing him hard into the wet grass, swallowing his recklessly loud moans.

Their third at an aquarium. The neon blue shadows play dreamy across the slope of his nose, the swell of his cheekbone. They soften the sharp cut of his chin. He looks young, _soft_ , beautiful. He laughs and his eyes crinkle with it, too. Oh fuck, Lu Han realizes then, oh fuck. The elder taps small restless palms against the cool glass, oohing at the sharks, and Lu Han’s fingers itch to thread through Minseok’s.

The fourth at a cafe. There’s a poetry reading and this awful thump in Lu Han’s chest. He watches Minseok’s eyelids flutter as he listens, rapt with attention, really fucking beautiful as he drinks in the world, drinks in his coffee. Lu Han feels sentimental, dangerously vulnerable. And he’s expecting Minseok to say something that afternoon. _Anything_ , but it’s the usual small secret smile. The usual, lingering caress of Minseok’s small, warm fingers against his hands.

And they’re day dates. _Hanging out_ , more than anything. Chaste.

And Lu Han wants to skip to the hot parts. Needy kisses, heavy touches, breathless moans, but Minseok’s small smile makes his heart feel tight, makes his skin buzz with anticipation. Makes his tongue feel thick and clumsy in his mouth. And he likes that, too.

Minseok doesn’t sleep with him. Doesn’t even kiss him goodnight—good afternoon. But there’s this ghost of a smile on his lips, the slightest quirk in his eyebrows. A definite challenge as he lingers outside his door, and Lu Han doesn’t want to back down.

It’s frustrating, though. So _fucking_ frustrating.

 

“They’re so _middle school_ ,” he complains to Yixing. “Juvenile. Like chaperone at school dances. Like church dates. I swear, we’ll go bowling next week. Maybe to the arcade. My students are getting more action than me.”

But Sehun sighs dreamily. “You’re _courting_ , hyung. Going steady. That’s so _romantic_.”

Yixing hums in agreement. Lu Han throws his chips and hits Sehun in the chin.

 

“Can we go out to dinner?” he asks Minseok. On Friday night, leaning his hip against the counter as he stirs his ramen pot. “Somewhere nice. I just finished report cards. I want to celebrate. Like an _adult_.”

Minseok laughs. His high-pitched, real one. It strains his phone’s speaker.

“Tomorrow. 8 o’clock?”

 

Lu Han agonizes for 2 hours over his outfit. Tries not to curse at Kyungsoo as he grumbles about how it all looks the _same_. Yixing, Sehun over Facetime are much more helpful. Humming, oohing, ahhhhing. He decides on a pair of his dark wash jeans. A parent-teacher’s conference dress shirt. Top three buttons undone. With a dark blazer.

“So handsome,” Yixing contributes.

And Lu Han exhales shakily.

 

He fiddles with the napkins. With his outfit. As he waits for Minseok at the Italian place by Minseok’s house.

Minseok smiles at him when he arrives. Right on time. And it’s like something clicks into place as he sighs in relief.

“Let’s have an _adult_ date,” Minseok tells him, leaning forward confidentially. He orders wine.

And Lu Han drinks enough to feel the beginnings of a slow burn in his veins, a pleasant tingle in his fingertips. Minseok’s eyes are so dark and his lips so red in the candlelit glow. He just wants to kiss him. Over and over and over again. That would be enough, he thinks, to feel the slight give of those plush lips moving against his, to drink in his quiet sighs and quieter moans. He’d be content.

“Do you believe in soulmates?” he asks suddenly. “Is that—when you mean—potential? Is that what you mean? Finding a soulmate. _Your_ soulmate.”

Minseok blinks, taps his fingers against his glass, but doesn’t make to answer, so Lu Han continues.

“What if your soul mate doesn’t think they’re _yours_ —anymore? What—what if it’s like...puzzle pieces, but you grind against each other until you **r** edges don’t—fit—anymore? Even though—even though you want to? And then you’re just this incomplete, bleeding, crooked little thing. No good for that person, but no good for anybody else? What then?”

“I don’t—I don’t think it works that way,” Minseok says, voice soft, but clear. “I think you—you’re more like...clay, I guess. You work together, mold around each other, fill in each other’s gaps. But you’re not—static. Not _hard_. And you keep—you keep trying.”

Lu Han rolls his shoulders. And the atmosphere is awkward and tense and heavy. It’s so heavy. He meets his eyes for a beat before dropping his gaze to his own wine glass. Suddenly self conscious.

Minseok laughs. It’s more a puff of air than anything.

“It doesn’t—we have too many heart to hearts. It’s so— _you’re_ so—”

“I’m not normally,” Lu Han interrupts. “I’m not…but you—”

Minseok’s eyes crinkle as he smiles. Reaches forward to squeeze his wrist.

“Well, we’re amazing at this,” he notes in a murmur. “Making things something they don’t need to be.”

“But it’s—” He gestures awkwardly.

“Do you want to keep talking about… _him_?”

Lu Han exhales shakily. “It’s not even—it’s not even like seeking people out in my hurt,” he answers after a long, drawn out pause. “That’s what they think it is, but it’s _not_. He’s not—it’s more like a phantom pain, you know. Hurting because I remember the hurt. I mourn that happy before, but it’s not like—not like I’m filling a void or soothing a sting.”

Minseok nods.

“It’s like—ah—I can’t drive, you know. I got into a car accident 5 years ago, and I can’t drive because I freak out when I get behind the wheel. It’s like—I—I get really upset because it’s been so long, and I don’t even know if I’ll be any good at it—anymore. But it’s not—it’s _not_ him. I’m just scared of doing it again—doing it wrong and getting _hurt_.”

“This is a test drive, then. _Potential_.”

“Yes,” Lu Han agrees. “Yes.”

Minseok nods solemnly. And there isn’t pity, wariness like with Kyungsoo. Fear like Sehun, Yixing. There’s understanding. _Empathy_.

 

The streetlights are on, and Lu Han feels the heaviness as he lingers outside Minseok’s apartment. Feels the tension. Feels the _want_. More pressing of all.

“I like you,” he admits, and Minseok smiles. His eyes twinkle in the dim light.

“I’m easy to like.”

Lu Han nods with a quiet laugh, and Minseok’s smile softens. He bows his head, bites his lower lip.

“I like you, too. I wouldn’t be going out with you if—if I didn’t.”

And Lu Han reaches forward to hold his hand between his. Playing with warm, soft, small fingers in his nervousness

“You really—” Lu Han doesn’t know how to finish his sentence so he drops it as he drops his gaze.

Minseok’s thumb grazes against his knuckle, and his voice is so soft—so dreamy— that Lu Han thinks for a second he’s imagined it. When it spreads warm, thick, perfect across his skin. ”Are you—are you gonna kiss me or—”

“Yes, yes, I’d like that.”

And then Lu Han makes sure to catch Minseok’s next retort with his mouth. He leans down, forward, humming against his lips, cradling his cheeks, murmuring his name in between whisper soft caresses.

Lu Han is really good at kissing—knows it for a fact—but it’s a heady jolt of warmth as Minseok sighs into his mouth softly, tugs him closer as he twist his fingers into his shirt. Lu Han’s hands fall to Minseok’s waist, kneading softly, urging him even closer. He coaxes his mouth open with harder kisses, the more succulent, insistent presses of his lips, and Minseok’s mouth opens with a soft moan.

They kiss for a _long_ time. So long his lips are tingling and his mind is hazy and his entire body is warm.

And they don’t deepen it much beyond that. Slow drags of tongues. Light sucks. Perfect and shameless right outside Minseok’s apartment building.

Minseok pulls away to exhale damp against his cheeks, nosing along his skin. “Do you stil want to—have—with me?”

“I wanted to _before_.”

“My—my” His voice is shaky and vulnerable and Lu Han feels exposed. Stripped. Needy. “301. If you _want_.”

“Of _course_ , I want.”

Minseok laughs, and it vibrates right against his cheekbones, his eyelashes flutter against Lu Hans’ cheek.

“Come upstairs with me.”

 

And it’s not love, not what Minseok says he wants it to be—not yet and not for a while, even in the thick pink haze of it, he knows better than to call it that—but the potential for it has him aching, gasping as his back crashes against the wall. Minseok curls his hand into the back of his neck as he kisses him, dragging him down to his height, tugging him even closer and _oh_ that’s nice.

Lu Han lets himself be pulled. Let’s himself be kissed, stripped, _touched_.

Minseok’s fingers graze along his chest, tease over his nipples, grip his hipbones as he pulls him hard. And Lu Han strains against his too-tight jeans, moaning into Minseok’s mouth as he grinds against his thigh.

Minseok chuckles against his neck, sucking along his Adam’s apple, licking at his jawline. His fingers drag against Lu Han’s clothed cock, and Lu Han groans as he jerks forward.

“Feel it,” he shifts, teases, lips grazing his with every carefully enunciated word. “The buildup, the _tension_ , the want. The _potential_. Isn’t it the best part?”

Lu Han’s _wanted_ from the beginning, but it’s almost painful now. Ripe for the taking. Just just just out of reach.

And then Minseok sinks to his knees, and Lu Han is fighting for breath, fighting to keep his eyes open.

Moaning, bucking. At the achingly perfect glide of sinful red lips. The achingly perfect beauty of sinful black eyes.

Minseok curls his tongue as he hums against him. He drags one of Lu Han’s hands to tangle in his hair, guide the pace of his slick, perfect bobs. Lu Han whimpers as his cock disappears over and over and over again into that perfect mouth. That perfect heat.

He pulls off with a slick pop to mouth at his navel, hand taking over. Fingers nimble, skilled, warm, fast. He circles his thumb along the crown of Lu Han’s cock as he blinks up at him. All slick red lips, furrowed eyebrows, hooded liquid eyes.

_Fuck_.

“I want you to come in my mouth,” he groans hotly. “But I also—fuck—I also want you come with my cock inside of you.”

Lu Han twitches in his hold, moans his name.

“ _Tell_ me.”

“Fuck me,” Lu Han urges. “Please just fuck me.”

Minseok presses a smirk to his bare, trembling thigh, and Lu Han whimpers.

 

But Minseok is softer as he leads him to his room. Softer as he presses him back into his bed. Softer as he kisses him slow and steady and succulent. Softer still as he whispers his name, coaxes his legs open, urges his finger inside. “So good,” he murmurs absently, words hot against Lu Han’s collarbone. “So good. So warm. So tight, Lu Han.”

And then he’s pressing a second, a third, whispers increasingly filthy, fingers increasingly bold. He shifts deliberately, smiles as Lu Han’s entire body jolts with the pleasure of it.

“Fuck me,” Lu Han reminds him, breathless, hips mindless, fucking back onto Minseok’s fingers. “Fuck me.”

 

And Minseok fucks the way he kisses.

Slow and tender, but teasing. He leaves Lu Han aching for it. Pressing back. Trying to take. But then relenting. Give giving giving because please Minseok I need this. Please.

Lu Han is breathless, dazed, desperate as he begs for more.

Minseok cradles his face, leans down to kiss his eyelids as he swivels inside of him, dragging hot and hard and heavy inside of him.

But Lu Han doesn’t need to adjust. He just _needs_. Please, Minseok, please. Know my body. Know what I need.

 

Lu Han is not a selfish lover. But Minseok, a Minseok cajoled, is downright indulgent. Almost punishingly so. As he rocks into him. Slow and fluid. Dragging moans and tremors and breathless, desperate bucks for more with every shift of his skillful hips.

Lu Han arches toward every forceful thrust of Minseok’s cock, breathing his name. He tangles his fingers in his damp hair, comes undone to the image of dark eyes, slick open lips.

Lu Han’s hand skitters down to his own cock. And he tries to match his strokes to the increasingly stuttery pace of Minseok’s hips. Rhythm even sloppier and clumsier as Minseok shifts inside of him, nudging at his prostrate.

Lu Han comes like that. Along his stomach, along his chest. With Minseok groaning his name, falling into him as he falls apart. Cock pulsing inside of him, release warm even through the thin layer of latex.

“Wow,” Lu Han manages as Minseok pulls out.

There’s potential, and they've actualized it. And Minseok’s breath is damp, labored against his chest.

He twines easily into him, and Lu Han thinks about maybe he wants to do it again. Maybe a lot. And it’s exhilarating. That thought that maybe he’ll even get to. Again and again until he’s had his fill. If things work out between them the way that Minseok wants.

But Lu Han is insecure in the afterglow. Unsure in the aftermath. “Am I your—are we exclusive—?”

But Minseok smiles against his shoulder, fingers dragging lazily against his trembling skin. And Lu Han thinks about those fingers molding him. Shaping him smooth and supple and beautiful. Until he fits just right. Fits with _him_. “I would _really_ like that."


End file.
